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Top Online Savings Accounts of 2018

If the time you spent searching for savings accounts was put towards budgeting or finding new opportunities to grow your money, imagine how much more you could have saved. Trusting the right bank can make all the difference, and our picks for the best online savings accounts really are worth it.

We analyze online savings accounts in the U.S. to uncover which have the best earnings, benefits, and the lowest fees. Learn more about our methodology here. Bank awards methodology

Top Savings Account With High Interest Rate

If growing your savings is your key motivator for opening an account, then a high-interest savings account might be what you’re looking for. We analyzed around 250 savings accounts from the top traditional banks, online banks, and credit unions to uncover the ones that deliver the highest interest rates, helping you grow your savings faster than other options.

Our Pick: Goldman Sachs Bank USA Online Savings

Best Feature: No transaction fees

A competitive interest rate without worrying about fees

The Goldman Sach Bank USA Online Savings account keeps it simple when it comes to saving. In addition to one of the top interest rates, the account comes with no monthly fees and no transaction fees at all. So, you can just focus on growing your savings.

Goldman Sachs Bank USA Savings Account Pros & Cons

Pros

Cons

Earn a very high interest rate

No minimum deposit required

No monthly fees

No transaction fees

No branch or ATM access

No mobile app -
web only

Online Savings Account With Consistently Good Rates

A high-interest rate is great, but not if you can’t count on it remaining at that level. That’s why we keep track of banks that offer the most consistent interest rates on savings accounts. The winners are the banks that change their interest rates the least of all others in the industry, giving customers a reliable savings rate.

Our Pick: Synchrony Bank High-Yield Savings Account

Best Feature: Consistently high rates

Optional ATM Card

No monthly maintenance fee

Synchrony Bank is hyper-focused on helping customers build savings and its savings account is designed for that common financial goal. Since its inception in 2014, the online bank kept its savings rate among the top ranks. Moreover, the account comes with no monthly fee and there's the option for an ATM card -- a handy benefit for those who want the ability to withdraw their cash in an emergency.

Synchrony Bank Savings Account Pros & Cons

Pros

Cons

Market-leading interest rate

Optional ATM card

No monthly maintenance fee

Mobile app available

No physical branches

Minimum balance required to earn APY

Best Low-Fee Savings Account

Savings won’t mean much if you’re constantly losing it to high fees. Whether the fee is for excessive withdrawals or monthly maintenance, we scoured banks to find out which keep fees at a minimum. See our winners for this quarter below.

Our Pick: Radius Bank High-Yield Savings Account

Best Feature: Free ATM card for cash withdrawals

High yield savings

Free ATM access worldwide

Radius Bank is big on providing easy and free access to your money - and its savings account is no exception to this. With this account, you can access your savings through a large network of ATMs, there’s no monthly fee, and you get a chance to earn a high APY.

Radius Bank Savings Account Pros & Cons

Pros

Cons

Market-leading interest rate

Optional ATM card

No ATM fees and unlimited ATM fee refunds

Mobile app available

No physical branches

Minimum balance required to earn APY

Best Money Market Savings Account

When it comes to savings accounts, money markets are the big players in high interest rates. If you have a large sum to put into savings and want to see it grow faster, a money market account can be the best way to save more by doing nothing. See our winners for this quarter below.

Our Pick: Capital One 360 Money Market Account

Best Feature: Great interest rate

Low Fees

Simple money market account with no fees

The Capital One 360 Money Market account is one of the best savings account packages out there, thanks to its combination of more earnings and more convenience. With this account, you can earn one of the highest interest rates on the market for no monthly fee. You can also access your money easily (through Capital One’s top-tier mobile app) and as often as you’d like (a rarity for a savings account of any kind).

The Study

How We Picked

How did we decide what makes a great savings account? We researched around 250 savings accounts from the top banks for this guide.

The Best Savings Account picks are based on the consistency of high-interest rates, fees, minimum balance requirements, and account features. The overall rank for each institution within a specific category is dependant on how many days in the quarter that institution’s score was among the top 10.

On the surface, savings accounts seem simple, but there are a number of things you need to pay attention to when picking a savings account:

Interest Rates

The interest rate is one of the most important aspects of a savings account. It can be the difference between losing to inflation and keeping pace with it. It can also accelerate your progress towards long-term savings goals.

Compounding, or the ability to earn interest on interest, is what makes interest so powerful. Imagine you’re trying to save $15,000 for a down payment on a home. Your plan is to put $100 a month into a savings account each month until you reach your goal. If you’re earning no interest, it will take you 150 months, or 12.5 years to reach your goal. If you’re earning 5% interest, it will take you less ten years. You’ll have contributed $12,000 and earned more than $3,000 in interest after 10 years. More than 20% of the money for your down payment will have come from interest.

Savings accounts rates at the top national banks

Bank

Offered APY

Chase

0.01%

Bank of America

0.03%

TD Bank

0.05%

Citizens Bank

0.01%

KeyBank

0.01%

SunTrust

0.01%

Citibank

0.04%

Wells Fargo

0.01%

PNC Bank

0.01%

U.S. Bank

0.01%

Average

0.02%

Teaser Rates

You might be willing to put up with the occasional fee if you have a big chunk of change in your savings account and that tasty interest rate makes it worth your while. However, that interest rate you signed up for might not be the one you’re getting a year, six months, or even three months down the road. And then, your account choice might not look like as nearly a good of choice anymore.

This is commonly called a teaser rate or an introductory rate, and the difference between what you get going in and what it changes to can be drastic, with your interest payments at times being cut nearly in half.

Fees and Minimums

Fees and minimums are the other major aspect of savings accounts that you need to watch out for. The entire idea of a savings account is for it to be a safe place for your money. You can hardly call a savings account safe if your bank will take the money from you with fees.

Unfortunately, many banks are now charging fees for even the most basic accounts. Bank of America®, for example, has a $5 monthly fee on its basic savings account. Chase has the same fee for its Chase Savings account. Since the interest rate at both banks is so low, those fees can easily outpace the interest you can earn.

There are usually ways to avoid fees on savings accounts. Bank of America® will waive its savings account fee if you maintain a $300 minimum balance. You can also avoid the fee if you have a checking account with Bank of America®. Similarly, Chase will remove the fee with a minimum balance of $300, or a monthly repeating transfer of $25 from a Chase checking account. Banks use fees to encourage their customers to act in specific ways.

If you don’t hit the minimum balances, some institutions will charge you if you don’t have another account at the same bank, like a checking account. This can limit your options when it comes to diversifying your banking.

Recurring Transfers

The ability to set up recurring transfers is a very useful feature for a bank account to have.

Recurring transfers can be used to send money to an investment account, move it to a vacation account, or otherwise automate your financial life. If you’re saving up for multiple financial goals at once, recurring transfers make it easy to do without having to spend hours entering transfer requests.

Setting up a recurring transfer should be a free feature at banks that offer it. Savings accounts are designed to make your financial life easier, and recurring transfers take that a step further.

Withdrawal Limits

You have the best of intentions to build larger savings, but we all know reality creeps in when you’re not expecting it. There may be times when you'll have to access those funds for urgent matters. It could be once a month or several times a month.

What you might not have read in the fine print is that too many withdrawals in a month can cost you. It is federal law for banks to limit withdrawals to a maximum of six per month for savings accounts.

Banks could charge an excess withdrawal fee for each withdrawal after reaching the limit. Some banks will start charging after three or four withdrawals per month. If these excess withdrawals become frequent, the bank could automatically convert your savings account to a checking account or close your account entirely.

Overdraft Protections

Overdraft fees are big business for banks. The banks, in turn, often offer a way for you to use your savings accounts to "protect" you from these fees. But the reality is they don't complete protect you, and only lessen the burn.

The way overdraft protection works by linking your savings account to your checking, and will automatically transfer funds to cover should you accidentally overdraft your checking. Sounds like a nice enough feature, and it makes sense. After all, you had the money -- just not in the right account. Anything to avoid that pricey $35 overdraft fee.

The problem is, this service often isn’t free. You’re being protected from overdraft, to be sure, but you’re still paying something for the service. Overdraft transfer fees cost about one-third of your typical overdraft fee. So while you are paying less than normal, you're still being charged -- making this one important feature. This is one feature to inquire about when evaluating your top savings account options.

Other Important Features

There are some other features we look for in savings accounts that can enhance an account:

The Ability to Open and Nickname Sub-accounts

Some banks let you separate your savings account into multiple pools of cash. You can then add a nickname like “vacation fund” or “down payment” to those sub-accounts. That makes it easy to track multiple goals at once.

Debit Card Access

Savings accounts might also offer debit cards so that you can withdraw your cash more easily. If yours does, be sure to keep track of what ATM network the bank is part of so that you can avoid fees.

Mobile Banking

A high quality mobile banking app can also make or break the savings account experience. Being able to transfer money or check your balance in a pinch is a useful tool. Once you get used to it, it’s difficult to not have those options.

Automatic Savings Programs

Other features, like Bank of America®’s Keep the Change program, can help you save in other ways. Knowing all of the miscellaneous features a savings account offers can help you decide on the right account for you.

FDIC Insurance

The FDIC insures every savings account in the United States for up to $250,000. Even if the bank that your savings account is at closes, you’ll get your money back (up to the covered amount).

The FDIC is backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. That means you can don’t have to worry about the FDIC running out of money. Every dollar you put in a savings account is completely safe.

Why Online Savings Accounts Tops Our Picks?

Online banks don’t have to charge fees to stay afloat due to their low overhead costs. By avoiding the need to rent buildings and hire tellers for physical locations, online banks can centralize their operations. This greatly reduces the cost of running the bank. Online banks also understand that it can be difficult not to have a physical location to visit when you need to withdraw or deposit cash. That’s why most online banks refund ATM fees, within reason.

Online banks are also able to offer high-interest rates because of their lower costs. As a bonus, online banks tend to have great mobile and online apps, since they’re the main interface customers will use.

Credit unions can also offer low fees and high-interest rates, but for a different reason than online banks. Credit unions are, in fact, owned by the people who open accounts with them. That means that they will always be run to try to maximize the benefit of account holders. However, credit unions have eligibility requirements that must be met before you can become a member.

An online savings account can be a great way to stash away your cash and earn interest. It’s certainly a better option than putting your extra money in a buried coffee can in the front yard or its bank equivalent, the interest-free checking account.

Many people do not realize that certain types of savings accounts can end up costing you money while earning a negligible interest rate. The associated fees could more than cancel out the money that you’re going to earn. So, your balance could actually get smaller with each passing month. A coffee can isn’t looking too bad now.

When opening a savings account, there are several little tricks banks can use to keep you from noticing discrepancies. This is a type of deposit account can be a virtually risk-free place to sock away cash until you figure out what else to do with it. But, you need to make sure you’re not going to get blindsided by hidden fees or other costs.

Best Money Market Accounts

Read Reviews of Other Notable Accounts:

Ask a Question

Friday, 10 Feb 2017 10:51 PM

<p>I love Ally Bank! If they would offer a bonus to open an account, big banks would lose a lot of money.</p>

Angelo_Frank

Tuesday, 19 Aug 2014 11:09 PM

<p>Good move Dolly. You are getting way more interest than you were at Citi. Just be aware of the withdrawal limits on money market accounts.</p>

dollyriviera

Monday, 18 Aug 2014 8:53 PM

<p>Learned this the hard way. I was not aware that I had to keep a minimum balance in order not to incur any fees. I left Citi because of this. I now bank with Ally using their Money Market Savings. They have no minimum balance or any monthly fees.</p>

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